Kroger clerk Sue Crocker stops fraud in progress

Sue Crocker, a veteran employee with the Kroger food store on Dequindre and 25 Mile roads in Shelby Township is being credited with saving a 90-year-old Sterling Heights woman $4,000 by stopping a fraud.

“She did one heck of a job,” Sterling Heights police Lt. Luke Riley said late Tuesday morning. “If she wouldn’t have suspected something was wrong and stopped it the victim would have been out $4,000.”

The incident occurred Monday, Riley said. The woman, who lives in the 41000 block of Pond View Drive in the 18 Mile-Dequindre roads area, said she got a call from a man who said he had her grandson being held hostage.

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The man told the woman he wouldn’t let him go unless the woman sent him $4,000 through Western Union.

“She was told by the caller not to tell anyone what was going on and then was allowed to hear what she thought was her grandson’s voice crying on the phone,” Riley said.

The woman withdrew $4,000 from her bank and went to the Kroger store to send a Western Union money order. Fortunately, Crocker was working and immediately realized that the elderly woman was being taken advantage of.

“The woman determined her grandson was okay and didn’t send the money order,” Riley said. “She put the money back into her own account and left the bank.”

When she got home, she received a call from the same man asking if she had sent the money. The caller wasn’t happy with the senior citizen when he told her she didn’t send any money.